Regular use or maintenance of prescription drugs has become important in ensuring the health of users thereof and is being stressed and advocated by health authorities and governmental agencies such as the United States Food and Drug Administration. To comply with a regimen, it is helpful to remember when the person taking the medication last took the medication. One way of helping in this regard is to have a closure with a visual indicator of when the closure package was last closed or when the package should be opened next.
Current compliance closures use expensive battery operated indicators. Other use mechanical constructions that are complex and costly.
Typical closures of the mechanical type are shown in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,151,599, 4,011,829, 4,365,722 and 5,009,338. Such closures have the disadvantage that they require axial movement between the reminder components. The axial movement between an outer closure member and an inner closure member of a child resistant closure would not permit such normal axial movement between the components of such reminder closures. In addition, relative axial movement and rotation between the reminder components can cause wear and obliteration of the indicia.
In accordance with the invention shown and claimed in the aforementioned application, a child resistant reminder closure comprises an outer closure member having a base wall and a peripheral skirt, an inner closure member having a base wall and a peripheral skirt with a bead on the outer closure member the inner closure member for limited axial outward movement relative to the outer closure member. An assembly of a day disk and an indexing disk is provided on the outer closure member and is rotatable relative thereto. The day disk is provided adjacent the inner surface of the base wall of the outer closure member and is mounted on the underlying indexing disk. A first set of flexible radial ratcheting fingers extend radially from the day disk and engage radial lugs on the undersurface of the base wall of the outer closure member. A second set of flexible radial ratcheting fingers extend radially from the day disk and engage circumferentially spaced lugs on the surface of the base wall of the inner closure member. Axially interengageable lugs and recesses are provided on the outer closure member and inner closure member which are adapted to be engaged to remove or apply the closure from a container thereby providing a child resistant feature. A window is provided on the outer closure member and is associated with indicia on the day disk to indicate the circumferential position of the outer closure member relative to the day disk.
Such a child resistant reminder closure of the mechanical type is reliable; functions to repeatedly provide the desired information; does not incorporate axial forces between the reminder components; utilizes old and well known child resistant construction; and can be manufactured readily in high-production.
Among the objectives of the present invention are to provide a child resistant reminder closure that has the advantages of the above described child resistant closure and only utilizes three parts; which utilizes the child resistant mechanism in the performance of the indexing function; which is resistant to indexing more than one position; and which can be readily modified to be non-child resistant.
In accordance with the invention, the child resistant closure comprising an outer closure member having a base wall and a peripheral skirt, an inner closure member having a base wall and a peripheral skirt with a bead on the outer closure member retaining the inner closure member for limited axial outward movement relative to the outer closure member. A indicator or a day disk is provided in the outer surface of the inner closure member and is rotatable relative to the outer and inner closure members. A first set of flexible radial ratcheting fingers extend radially from the day disk and engage radial lugs on the undersurface of the base wall of the outer closure member. A second set of flexible radial ratcheting fingers extend radially from the day disk and engage circumferentially spaced lugs on the upper surface of the inner closure member. Axially interengageable lugs are provided on the outer closure member and the inner closure member which are interengaged to remove the closure or to apply the closure to a container thereby providing a child resistant feature. A window is provided on the outer closure member and is associated with indicia on the indicator disk to indicate the circumferential position of the outer closure member relative to the indicator disk.
More specifically, the closure includes A series of axial abutments equally spaced on the circumference of the inner closure skirt. One or more axial abutments are located on the interior of the skirt of the outer closure member. These abutments contact each other when the outer closure member is rotated in the clockwise (application) direction to transmit rotation and/or torque from the outer closure member to the inner closure member. The interengaging lugs on the top panel of the inner and outer closures also perform this function if they are moved into axial engagement.
These abutments on the skirt of the inner closure member ratchet past the abutments on the outer closure member when the outer closure member is rotated in the counterclockwise (removal) direction. The purpose of these abutments is to prevent someone from moving the inner and outer closure members axially apart, and rotating the outer closure member in a clockwise direction to any indexing position.